I spoke with a handful of medium to larger sized home builders yesterday who told me 6 weeks ago that they felt their starts would be down by around 40~50% in Q2 2023. Yesterday most of them said that their starts will actually only be down by around 5~10%. This was in the Southeast US where 58.1% of all current US housing starts are located right now. What are you hearing in other parts of the US?
With the initial pessimism actually turning to optimism, will this lead to higher prices with a sudden increase in demand?
Is anyone hearing anything about the DIY sector? What is the take away for HD, Lowe’s and Menards currently?
